Front Burner - The fight to control the Arctic

Episode Date: September 4, 2019

Who owns the Arctic? There are several countries who think they have a right to the North Pole or the rich territory around it. Russia has a military presence close by, and recently fired two missiles from the Arctic Ocean as a show of strength. Mike Pompeo, the U.S. secretary of state, has called the Arctic "the forefront of opportunity and abundance" for the United States. And Canada is among the countries that have submitted scientific evidence bolstering a claim of sovereignty over the North Pole. Neil Shea recently travelled to the Arctic for National Geographic, and spent time with a group of Canadian Rangers responsible for bolstering Ottawa's claim. "There's a lot of oil and gas, and on the land, there's a lot of minerals," says Shea, who notes the Arctic land rush has been the result of climate change. "There's trillions of dollars of stuff that hasn't been accessible. But now that everything is melting, you have more opportunity to get at it."

In the Dragon's Den, a simple pitch can lead to a life-changing connection. Watch new episodes of Dragon's Den free on CBC Gem. Brought to you in part by National Angel Capital Organization, empowering Canada's entrepreneurs through angel investment and industry connections. This is a CBC Podcast. Hello, I'm Jamie Poisson. You've probably heard a lot about the Arctic recently. Two Saturdays ago, Russia fired two missiles up there. The United States recently proposed buying Greenland, which would give them a strategic advantage in the north.

An idea that Danish Prime Minister Meda Fredriksson said was absurd. Quote, Greenland is not Danish. Greenland belongs to Greenland. And Canada even filed a claim with the UN saying we deserve to have sovereignty in the Arctic Circle, which includes the North Pole. The federal government has submitted more than 1,200 pages of scientific evidence to prove their point.

Why is all of this happening? Neil Shea has been covering this for years. He recently went to visit the Canadian Rangers in the Arctic for National Geographic magazine. We're here to talk about what a lot of people are calling the new Cold War in a very cold place. This is Frontburner. This is Frontburner. Neil, thank you so much for being with us today. My pleasure to be here.

So I know you were recently up there and you went out on patrol. Can you tell me what your expedition was like? I joined a unit of rangers on King William Island in the town of Joe Haven. And we went out onto the land for about a week, maybe a little bit more than a week, during one of their annual training exercises. So we took a snowmobile procession out onto the tundra, set up camp on a frozen lake, and then for the next several days, the rangers practiced navigation and a search and rescue. They did some rifle training and a lot of fishing. What was it like? Where did you sleep?

I slept with a pair of rangers, the newly elected command sergeant of the patrol, a guy named Marvin Atkutuk and his father. And so we just put up one of these big canvas minor tents, like a big straight-walled white tent. We piled in there on top of a bunch of caribou skins in our sleeping bag. So yeah, right on top of the ice. And how cold was it on a scale of one to 10? So for me, for a Southern boy, it was probably a seven or an eight. For them, it was probably like a five.

But I think that it was in Fahrenheit. Pardon my Fahrenheit here, but I think it was down around 20 below for me. Yeah, really, really cold. I hate the winter, so I can't even imagine. You know, you mentioned that these rangers were training. Can you give me a sense of who they are and what they're doing up there? Yeah, the rangers are an old program in Canada. They go back to the late 40s, and they've been called different things, but Canada's Eyes and Ears in the North is one name that has stuck with them. And they're essentially small groups of people from local communities up in the north, often Indigenous people but not always, who are attached to the Canadian military.

Each ranger gets trained in marksmanship, navigation, first aid, and search and rescue. In return, the Canadian military gets world-class guides and scouts. And so they'll do a couple of exercises each year where a Canadian military trainer will come and visit them, and then they'll go out on the land practicing search and rescue techniques. They do land navigation. They learn how to use GPS units. And the Canadian government supplies them with equipment, rifles, boots, hats, clothing, stuff like that. So it's a way for the Canadian military and the Canadian government to keep in touch with far out communities up in the north. Sergeant Bill Budd is a ranger trainer, but he says he learns a lot more from the rangers than he can teach them. How to look for good snow to build an igloo.

A lot of mechanical stuff with the machines. They're really good at using very little resources. Some of these patrols and the presence of the rangers help Canada establish sovereignty or maintain sovereignty. Sort of maintain control of Canada's territory. So there's an idea in international law that if nobody lives in a place for an extended time, that that land doesn't belong to anyone. Particularly centuries ago, different nations could try to claim it. So in particular, Greece fjord, Canadian government moved Indigenous people to that community so they could establish sovereignty really on the island there and make a claim that it was Canadian territory.

Now the Canadian government is apologizing. They were not properly informed of how far away and how different from Anuktuak their new homes would be. Starving and cold because we lived in a tent first year. My mother, she used to put snow in a bottle, melt it under her arm, put a raw flower inside, and that's how my brother survived. And who would we be trying to protect it from? Nobody expects that there ever really be an armed conflict in the North where, you know, say this back in the 80s, the Soviets would come over the ice, try to take some kind of Red Dawn maneuver and take part of

Canada. Right. And it's just like these 20 guys with rifles. They're not going to stop the Russians. Protecting it just sort of means to maintain a government and civilian presence so that Canada maintains jurisdiction over its land. Okay, well, I want to talk to you about why we might want to do that and then why other countries want to do that too. So there's been a lot of news recently about who actually owns the Arctic. We're talking about a remote environment. There are a few people that live there in some parts of it. As you mentioned, no people live there. And yet all these countries want ownership over its most valuable parts.

And tell me why that is the case. Well, there's a lot of stuff there under the ground or under the seabed. There's a lot of oil and gas. And on the land, there's a lot of minerals that could be accessed. So basically, there's trillions of dollars worth of stuff up in the Arctic that has not really been accessible for most of human history. It's been too cold, too dark, too dangerous to get at it. But now that everything's melting, there is more opportunity to get into those places, to explore, to see what's there,

and to start to sort of build the infrastructure that you would need to take advantage of some of those resources. Take Greenland, for example. Along ice-free stretches of coast, there are significant deposits of oil and gas, as well as rare earths. There are also precious metals, such as uranium, gold and platinum. The one sleeper thing that I think nobody really talks about, and I don't know why, maybe it's just too boring, but it's fish.

Fish stocks are really starting to suffer all over the world, and they're being overfished everywhere except in the north. And I think as people get hungrier, they're going to start looking at those nice fish stocks and saying, how can we get a piece of that action? Russia has been spending a lot of money to prepare for a more aggressive claim on Arctic ownership. And take me to 2007. What did they do back then? That was sort of the year that a lot of climate scientists say everything changed. At the time, the ice pulled back to its lowest extent that had ever been reported. The sea ice, I mean. And the Russians also sent up an expedition where they dropped a pair of submersibles to the bottom of the sea floor, something like 14,000 feet down.

And they planted a titanium Russian flag on the seabed and made a symbolic claim over the North Pole. The Russians used an icebreaker to carve out a 500-foot by 30-foot hole in the ice so the subs could die. People should get used to the fact that we were the first. When the Americans went to the moon, we didn't say anything. And Arctic has always been ours, and the fact that we are their first is great. It's great. And of course, it all depended on the organization of this unique and historic expedition. That pissed a lot of people off and agitated them. It's such a wild thing to do.

A normally subdued Canadian government has reacted with anger to the Russians. Their foreign minister saying, this isn't the 15th century. You just can't run around the world planting flags and claiming territory belongs to you. And then I know that, as you mentioned, this was really symbolic, but what have they been doing since in the region? Tons. So Russia has been the most active Arctic state since warming sort of started to change the way things run up there. And since 2007, when the Russian economy sort of began to recover, they've built a lot of bases. They've repainted a lot of their old warships, and they've built new ones. They've got tons of icebreakers.

They've got military bases all over the place, new squadrons of soldiers. Painted like a Russian flag, it's called trefoil for its three-cornered structure, a sprawling new military base that can house 150 troops and warplanes. This is the Akchik Brigade. In training, the Kremlin has also previously released video of reindeer riding Russian soldiers. They've invested billions in their oil and gas infrastructure,

and they're really looking forward to when ships will be able to pass from Europe to Asia and back using something called the Northern Sea Route on the Russian coast. So they've been looking forward to this as sort of like, as one academic told me, they call it their strategic future resource base. They look at the Arctic as a place that in the future, they'll be able to derive a lot of wealth. What do you know about what Canada is doing? Canada has been relatively slow to do anything with their north. I know that Canada has made a lot of promises about what they're going to bring to the north and how they're going to develop northern communities to be prepared to take advantage of these changes but there hasn't been a lot as far

as i know that's been really uh accomplished i do think that the canadian government recently built a naval refueling post for b-ships and coast guard ships and i do believe that they're continue to work on their deep water harbor in Iqaluit. The new facility will reduce the cost of sea lift, unloading downtime. The big tidal range on Frobisher Bay can cost the shipping companies $60,000 a day as they wait for the tides to change. But I'm not sure that a whole lot more has been done. And Canada has a huge territory up there. I think it's second only to Russia.

And so the Canadians have been relatively slow to take an interest in that. And for Americans, we've probably been even slower. Right. But particularly compared to what Russia is doing up there. You know, you mentioned the Americans. We recently saw this plan to buy Greenland. Essentially, it's a large real estate deal. A lot of things could be done.

And strategically for the United States, it would be nice. You know, I think a lot of people thought that this was outlandish. But do you think that this is an indication that the Americans are starting to take this seriously? President Truman, his government back in the late 40s or early 50s, also tried or floated the idea of buying Greenland. But that was at a time when the Cold War was really hitting fever pitch. I think Trump's sort of desire to buy Greenland, who knows where that came from, maybe for golfing. Okay, that's a fair point. But what about Mike Pompeo? So the Secretary of State has also been talking about the Arctic. He recently went to the Arctic Council and made a very aggressive claim about American talking about the Arctic. He recently went to the Arctic Council and made a very aggressive claim about American rights over the Arctic. This is America's moment to stand up

as an Arctic nation and for the Arctic's future. He put a stake in the ground and warned other countries not to act aggressively. And so there was time for American leadership in the North. And he basically said the North is open for business. The Arctic is at the forefront of opportunity and abundance. Steady reductions in sea ice are opening new passageways and new opportunities for trade. I think shocked a lot of people who were present at that meeting. And it was an unusually out there statement for an American secretary of state. I don't think we've had that sort of bold language around the North for a long time. We must hold each other accountable and we must not allow this form to fall victim to subversion from Arctic or non-Arctic states.

That was surprising to me. It was surprising to a lot of others. And we don't really know what it means, what Pompeo intended by that. But I think it was partly to counter moves by Russia and China. Got it. And we should talk about China for a minute. China doesn't have a border that is adjacent to the Arctic. They actually don't own any parts of the Arctic, but they have been mining camps in Greenland, I understand. And President Xi Jinping released this Arctic policy white paper. They're essentially looking at this as like a polar silk road. So China is also doing a lot in this area as well. That's right. They're essentially looking at this as like a polar silk road. So China is

also doing a lot in this area as well. That's right. They've invested a lot of money in Russian oil and gas infrastructure. They're very interested in shipping routes that would take them across the top of the world and get them to European markets faster. So China has got a lot of interest. They've started to build their own icebreaker fleets. They've sent icebreakers into the Canadian north before and probably will do so again. As one scholar put it to me, the Chinese know they don't have any claim to the north, to the Arctic, but trying to see what they can get. And if they can get anything, they want to try. Okay. That feels like China's strategic plan the world over right now. And I should say, just to be clear, there are countries that own parts of the Arctic right now.

The U.S., Canada, Denmark, Norway, and Russia. Because we have borders that surround the Arctic. But the idea here is that all of these countries are looking to expand their territorial claims. And then there is a specific fight between Russia, Canada and Denmark over this one area that includes the North Pole. Am I right? Is that a fair way to summarize it? Pretty close. Most of the territory is not up for grabs. Most of it has already been sort of settled. There's not a whole lot of territory up at the top of the world that's still up for grabs. It's only that part around the North Pole. I know that you spent some time with these Canadian rangers, many of whom are indigenous. What are they saying to you about all of this? What do

they think about all of this? It was a bit of a mixed bag with opinions from the Inuit I was with. There were members of the Netsilik group on King William Island. Most of them felt like they were being left out of these conversations. These conversations were things that happened in the South, and then the Inuit were told about them later. But some people did feel like the government kept coming and asking their opinions. But I think that on the whole, the changing Arctic felt very remote. So it's sort of a confusing time where I don't think any one person has a lockdown of what's going on.

In the Dragon's Den, a simple pitch can lead to a life-changing connection. Watch new episodes of Dragon's Den free on CBC Gem. Brought to you in part by National Angel Capital Organization, empowering Canada's entrepreneurs through angel investment and industry connections. I am curious to get your perspective here on what you think happens next. There are these specific territories, particularly the North Pole, that are highly disputed. It's my understanding that the United Nations decides at some point will decide who gets these territories. They have been disputed for many years and the United Nations has not decided yet. But even if the United Nations does decide, is that even going to do anything?

That's a good question. I don't know what shape the North will ultimately take. But let's say that they just decided to award the North Pole to Denmark. Right. And Russia says, no, thanks. We'll just take it. It's interesting because the Russians have sort of like, we could say that they've behaved badly from a Western point of view in other parts of the world, Syria, the Ukraine, Crimea, but they haven't done anything too unusual in the North. And a lot

of scholars told me that the North is a place where the Russians try not to rock the boat too much. They've done everything sort of quote unquote by the book to this point. And even there, when they dropped the submersibles down to the seabed in 2007, nobody really took that as a sign of anything too serious. It was sort of like Russia, you know, puffing its chest out a little bit. But that wasn't a legal claim. They were just doing sort of a publicity stunt. And these missiles that Russia has been launching, is this part of this luster that we're seeing from them? I think so. I think we're entering a period where there's a lot more military activity going on up there. The Russians have started flying their planes much closer to American airspace and

Canadian airspace. U.S. fighter jets intercepting a half a dozen Russian warplanes off the coast of Alaska. And NATO forces have responded with big military exercises like you saw in Norway last year. The biggest exercises NATO has run since the end of the Cold War. Even though I don't think there's going to be any kind of war, all the sides are starting to get a little bit more aggressive in what their militaries are doing in the north. I certainly don't believe that Russia wants a conflict in the north. It's too expensive. It's too dangerous. The distances are too great. And as a lot of people told me, Russia's economy and its political system are sort of on the decline right now.

So I don't think they want to try to engage in any kind of dangerous activity in a place that will just ramp up the bill for them in all kinds of ways. You see these headlines a lot, right? The possibility of a cold war in the Arctic. Do you think that's hyperbolic? I do. I fought with my editors about using that title. I wasn't just talking about your piece, which is very nuanced and excellent, I will add. Thank you. Editors can't sort of steer themselves away from a good pun or like a throwback title like the new Cold War. There's like a historical throw there.

There's a pun in there. There's all this stuff that editors love. I don't think it accurately reflects what's happening in the North. Part of our story, the hope for our story, we could sort of counter that almost militaristic or jingoistic narrative that seems to be applied to the North all the time. When I was up there, I was with a military unit very loosely. The Canadian Rangers don't march around and sort of like carry semi-automatic rifles and all that stuff. And even in the other parts of the Arctic, when I went out with the Norwegian Coast Guard up to the archipelago of Svalbard, everybody was very relaxed.

There wasn't a feeling that, you know, war was going to break out soon. So I think that when you get the editorial desire to make things seem dramatic and then you get somebody like Pompeo and somebody like Trump together, it's a perfect storm of disinformation. Nobody wants to start a fight in the North. That was my sense. And nobody was really prepared to do that. Neil, thank you so much for this really nuanced and interesting conversation. Thank you for having me. It was a pleasure. So you may remember in Tuesday's election pod, we talked about the new slogans the parties had been releasing. Well, we were still waiting on the NDP at the time, but yesterday they delivered. And their new slogan is, drumroll, in it for you. I don't work for the wealthy and well-connected. I don't think government should be run for their

benefit like it has for decades. I believe that government should work for all of us. Okay, that's all for today. Thanks so much for listening to FrontBurner, and we'll see you tomorrow. Thank you.